Judges at the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards, recently held in Paris, have crowned Phaidon the number one cookbook publisher in the world!

Totally well deserved in my eyes, especially looking at the most recent cookbook to come from the company – Coco – my new all time favourite.

As well as Coco, Phaidon is the publisher of many other top cook books including ‘The Silver Spoon’, deemed the most successful Italian cookbook of the last 50 years, and Spanish home cooking best seller ‘1080 Recipes’.

The jury at the awards cited “the creative design, enormous investment in quality production, inventive concepts, and distribution power in many languages” as the reasons behind Phaidon’s success.

The news gets better though, because in the next few months, Phaidon will publish two new cookbooks: ‘Recipes from an Italian Summer’ and ‘The Book of Tapas’. Also ‘A Day at elBulli’ will be published in paperback. Can’t wait!

It just proves that you can eat amazing food at affordable prices when a canteen in Hong Kong, serving dim sum at only 80 pence, is awarded a Michelin star.

When the global downturn hit, Mak Pui Gor, who previously worked at the Four Seasons Hotel restaurant, decided that there was a gap in the market to open a canteen serving delicious food at bargain prices and has been rightly awarded for doing so.

Tim Ho Wan, a small canteen seating only 20 people, serves affordable dim sum and is so popular that people regularly queue for an hour to eat the delights of Mak Pui Gor.

The most expensive dish in the restaurant is a plate of noodles at less than £3.00. Michelin Guide director, Jean-Luc Naret, highlighted the restaurant as being the “most affordable starred restaurant in the world”.

Please, please, please can we have one in London – pretty please with cherries on the top?

Last night, The RSPCA held its prestigious Good Business Awards ceremony in central London, which revealed the public’s favourite ethical supermarket.

The aim of these awards, now in their fifth year, is to encourage businesses to implement policies that will have a positive impact on animal welfare, so massive congratulations to The Co-op who is now crowned ‘People’s Choice Supermarket’, with 59 percent of the votes!

The Co-operative - Ian Burgess, Robert McBride picking up their award

This year, The RSPCA partnered with daily newspaper, The Independent, who offered the public the opportunity to vote for their favourite animal-friendly supermarket – the one they felt was putting animal welfare first. The shortlist, chosen by a panel of judges, was announced in August and the public were able to vote for Marks & Spencer, Sainsbury’s or The Co-operative – I have included their principle achievements below, but the clear winner was Co-operative, making the biggest strides to improve animal welfare – Rock on Co-op!

Sainsbury’s should also be proud to have received the award for most improved supermarket, for its continued commitment to deliver on animal welfare values and principles, including having the largest range of Freedom Food labelled products.

David Bowles, Head of External Affairs for the RSPCA said, “Through the People’s Choice Award we wanted to give the public a chance to voice their opinions and reward the supermarket they believe has listened to them and made the biggest strides in improving animal welfare… in the eyes of the public the Co-operative was the clear winner taking over half of the vote. This is the fifth year of the Good Business Awards and we felt it was important to reward the efforts being made by supermarkets that go the extra mile to promote animal welfare and recognise that consumers haven’t left behind their concerns for good animal welfare practices in a quest for value.”

Here is a short summary of the three finalist’s achievements:

M&S

All whole and ingredient eggs free-range

All fresh chicken free-range, or higher welfare standards

All fresh pork outdoor-bred

Continental white veal banned in 2008

Sainsbury’s

All whole eggs free-range

Own eggs/chicken brand improves shelter for birds

Largest range of RSPCA Freedom Food products

All Scottish salmon sustainably sourced and Freedom Food approved

The Co-operative

All whole eggs free-range

All fresh and frozen chicken reared to higher welfare standards

First to adopt RSPCA Freedom Food in 1994

Own-label Freedom Food approved pork ranges

These are all fantastic achievements, but I had hoped that all supermarkets would be working to this level by now – clearly not – so shame on the others for not making it to the finals!

There were three overall categories, Cosmetics, Fashion and Food – I have pasted a list of the winners in the food category below, but details on the others can be found on the award’s website.

Haribo has just come bottom in a new eco index that looks at the impact british grocery brands have on the environment – so it’s going straight off my shopping list – and is promptly being replaced by masses of Quality Street.

Researchers at environmental consultancy EnvirUP and Nottingham University worked together to evaluate 100 products looking at packaging, airmiles, energy used in production, fairtrade ingredients etc.

Unilever products were awarded the eco crown with Persil and PG Tips coming first and second. Muller Light and Haribo Jellies, shame on you for coming 99 and 100th respectively.